film - The Jungle Book

Pre-production & production

- directed by: Jon Favreau
- screenplay: Justin Marks
- actors: Bill Murray (Baloo), Idris Elba (Shere Khan), Jon Favreau (Pygmy Hog), Ben Kingsly (Baghera),  Scarlette Johansen (Kaa)
- new technologies:
     - CGI - high production value
     - photo realistic rendering
     - key frame computer animation
- budget: $175 mill


what audiences want from a film:

• escapism
• entertainment
• well-known actors
• large special effects
• high production values:
• mega special effects - use of technologies
• "clean" look
• 3D
• digital cameras
• IMAX ↓

audiences:

↳media producers consider how audiences might react & engage w/ text - factors in predicting audience reaction:

- audience engagement - describes how an audience interacts w/ media text - different people react in different ways to same text

- audience expectations - advance ideas audience may have about a media text - particularly genre pieces - producers often play w/ / deliberately shatter audience expectations (e.g. book → film)

- audience foreknowledge - definite info (rather than vague expectations) which audience brings to media text


counting audiences:

↳different types of media texts measure their audiences in different ways

- film figures are based on box office receipts & cinema takings (rather than the no. of people who have actually seen the movie)

- subtract production costs of movie from the box office receipts to find profit - shows how successful it has been in the profit-driven movie business

- a film which doesn't cost much to make (e.g. 'The Blair Witch Project) & takes even a small amount @ the box office, can be considered a greater success than a big action movie w/ smaller profit margin


Hypodermic Needle Theory / Banura: (the media can influence people directly)

- info from a text passes into the mass consciousness of the audience unmediated - experience / intelligence / opinion of individual not relevant to reception of the text

- we are manipulated by the creators of media texts & our behavior & thinking can be easily changed - audience are passive - why certain groups in society shouldn't be exposed to certain media texts (e.g. children to violent films)


Hall's 3 main perspectives:
1. preferred / dominant readings - audience interprets the text as closely to the way the producer intended
2. negotiated readings - audience goes through negotiation w/ themselves to allow them to accept the way the text is presented - may agree w/ some elements & disagree w/ others - may need to adjust viewpoint to get the most out of the viewing
3. oppositional / resistant readings - audience rejects text due to their beliefs / experiences (e.g. narrative in soap opera that views a woman of having an affair sympathetically will encourage resistant reading to individual's culture against adultery)


Synergy:
- synergy = when the interaction of 2(+) forces working together creates a greater effect than the sum of their individual efforts
- media synergy = different elements of a media conglomerate work together to promote linked products across different media
- works when different elements within a media conglomerate promote (e.g. film studio, record label, video game division) create linked products (e.g. film, soundtrack, video game)
- each distinct element promotes the others - all connected (chain)
- can be through product placement
- e.g. film 'High School Musical' promotes DVD promotes soundtrack promotes advent calendar promotes doll promotes sequel promotes Disney Store promotes film


IMAX:

• experience
• clarity, detail & size
• cinema - 2 projectors simultaneously - perfect image w/ balance of warmth & sharpness
• close to reality
• camera is immense
• 240 pounds (normal camera = 40 pounds)
• requires special support to move
• small film size
• holds 3 min spool & 20 min reload
• incredible detail
• every shot must be perfect
• audience sees every flaw
• expensive
• high cost & complexity of all physical production aspects

digital technologies in film production:

• performance capture
• created for 'Avatar' (2009)
• developed by Andy Serkis for 'Lord of the Rings' (Imaginarium Studios)
• = technical process used to translate an actor's performance into a digital character 
• e.g. 'The Lord of the Rings', 'King Kong', 'Avatar'
• every facial expression, body movement & vocalization is recorded by synchronized specialized cameras to deliver a computer generated ('digital') character
• allows for real-time communication & spontaneity on set between actors / actor & director
• performance gives character life
• teams of highly skilled visual effects artists
• audience can emotionally engage

summary of The Jungle Book production:

- principle photography took place @ sound stages, L.A. Centre Studios, downtown L.A.

     - only actor: Mowgli actor

- Jim Henson's Creature Shop - brought in to provide animal puppet figures for Sethi to act against - none appear in finished film

- using rig 'SimulCam' (developed on 'Avatar') - crew combined live-action footage - shot in native 3D using a Cameron-Pace pig - w/ the previs set & motion - capture in real time

     - "you'd see the kid w/ a guy in a blue suit / a pupeteer, then w/ SimulCam you'd see the bear walking next to him. we had the editing system on-set & we could cut what we just shot into the movie so that at any given time you could watch the whole thing" - Jon Favreau

     - finally, finished footage would go to post-production for the bulk of visal-effects work - animating every hair (modelled from real animals) & shadow by hand - editing - feels real